Top 10 NBToday Videos: Local Journalism in Action

NEW BRUNSWICK, NJ—In honor of our first five years of covering the city we love, we've put together a highlight reel of some of our biggest accomplishments and most memorable moments captured on video.

Since December 2011, New Brunswick Today has been working hard to educate and empower the community about what is going on in New Brunswick and the rest of Middlesex county. We ask the tough questions that the community wants us to ask, and sometimes things can get very interesting, especially when a camera is rolling.

NBToday is presently the city's only bilingual community newspaper, and needs support from our readers now more than ever. We are also celebrating our five-year anniversary with a special event at 6:30pm on January 28 at the Dillinger Room, located at 338 George Street in downtown.

We hope that you can join us on the 28th and become a member to start receiving our bilingual print edition.

In the meantime, please enjoy some classic videos featuring several moments that show what we are all about.

Top 10 Videos of NBToday in Action:

#10 Assaulted by a Rutgers official for trying to ask the President a question

March 26, 2014: The "Director" of President Bob Barchi's office assaulted our editor, but we still went on to expose Barchi's big payday, and worked with RUPD to identify the culprit, who we exposed in another article later that year.

#9 Got Chris Christie to lose his cool by asking him about Donald Trump

April 11, 2016: Chris Christie couldn't resist resorting to name-calling and making jokes to take the heat off him when we asked how much blame Trump deserved for the poor financial situation in Atlantic City, and asking him if Trump was an honorable man. (video credit: Governor's Office)

#8 Confronted the county prosecutor about his deficient disclosure forms

June 16, 2016: Middlesex County's top cop Andrew Carey needed to call for back-up after he didn't want to answer questions from NBToday about his potential ethics violations, a police killing in New Brunswick, and his habit of parking illegally.

#7 Tracked down Mayor Cahill in Milltown during water quality cover-up scandal

December 11, 2013: New Brunswick's Mayor Jim Cahill proved to be elusive as the city was rocked by a big scandal that eventually sent the man in charge of the city's water quality to prison. But NBToday made a special trip to Milltown to catch up with Cahill at his side job and force him to address this scandal. (video credit: Sean Monahan)

#6 Documented "Delafest" chaos in New Brunswick for the world to see

April 13, 2013: New Brunswick Today captured some astonishing footage of the chaos and the ensuing police crackdown on a wild Saturday afternoon in the Sixth Ward. Our footage of the massive party has been viewed more than one million times online, and has also been aired on several television stations. (video credit: Charlie Kratovil, Lauren Varga, Sean Monahan)

#5 Caught Council President Kevin Egan violating the City's Code of Ethics

September 2, 2015: Council President Kevin Egan went on the offensive when he criticized this newspaper's editor for not owning property in the Hub City. But our follow-up questions eventually exposed that Egan owns four houses, including one that he repeatedly failed to list on his financial disclosure forms. (video credit: City of New Brunswick Office of Public Information)

September 11, 2015: After a series of critical public safety articles in New Brunswick Today, and a successful public records lawsuit filed by our editor, the city and Rutgers announced unprecedented police cooperation, and expanded crime alerts. Unfortunately, Rutgers hasn't always kept its word to issue alerts for all "serious crimes," but we continue to hold their feet to the fire.

#3 Got the AG's Office to investigate election irregularities in New Brunswick

March 26, 2013: When Governor Chris Christie called on our editor, we got him to agree to ask his Attorney General to investigate New Brunswick's first-ever school board election, which had been the topic of a series of investigative articles in NBToday. Unfortunately, the ensuing AG investigation did not result in much of anything, but law enforcement weren't the only ones who took a second look. News12's investigative reporter Walt Kane also did his own investigation, which aired in April 2013. (video credit: Jad Kaado)

#2 Questioned cops who got a warrant to take potential corruption evidence from us

December 20, 2016: The powers that be cracked down on New Brunswick Today with an unconstitutional search warrant for our office, and we got the whole thing on video. The incident sparked outrage in the local community as well as among advocates for journalism and the First Amendment. It also heightened concerns over corruption at the embattled New Brunswick Water Utility, sparked critical coverage on television and in national media outlets, and even prompted the Mayor's Office to issue their own scathing press release targeting us.

#1 Exposed and helped end the city's experiment with water privatization

August 20, 2014: Forty-five days after we exposed the Mayor's secret water privatization deal at a City Council meeting, just as the city's initial short-term contract with American Water was about to expire, we caught up with Mayor James Cahill at a ribbon-cutting and pressed him about what the future would hold for the embattled New Brunswick Water Utility. Cahill responded by mocking us, and refusing to answer any questions, instead saying, "When you learn to ask accurate questions you will get responses." We must have learned to ask those accurate questions pretty swiftly, because about one month later Cahill sat down for the first of several extended interviews with New Brunswick Today. The privatization experiment ended thirteen months later after a series of award-winning articles in NBT, as well as public pressure from activists, reporters, community organizations, businesses, and residents.

Charlie is the founder and editor of New Brunswick Today, and the winner of the Awbrey Award for Community-Oriented Local Journalism. He is a proud Rutgers University journalism graduate and a community organizer, and was an independent candidate for Mayor of New Brunswick in 2018.

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